No hard times for CSU execs

Monday

Jul 9, 2012 at 8:17 AMJul 9, 2012 at 8:18 AM

The Orange County Register

It's been a long time since Plato and Aristotle walked ancient Athens in tunics and sandals, instructing their students. Nowadays, higher education is big business – with hefty salaries for those at the top. That's especially so in the California State University system.

"Average pay for the system's 34,270 fulltime employees in 2011 was $63,810," reported a special investigation in the Register on July 1. "In 2010, 34,451 full-time employees earned $60,010." So the average pay of full-time employees jumped 6 percent — at a time the university has been slashing programs and raising tuition.

The university said the pay boost was from furloughs in 2010 not being continued in 2012. Nice for them. But how many private-sector employees got 6 percent raises, for whatever reason?

"Some 115 California State University employees earned $200,000 or more in 2011, up from 92 in 2010," according to the Register analysis. Cal State Fullerton's recovery was even more bountiful than the overall system's, "growing 9.5 percent in one year to $179.2 million in 2011, a net increase of 4.9 percent since 2009. Eight of those earning $200,000 or more worked at Cal State Fullerton."

Most eyebrow-raising are the tax-paid salaries at the top. CSU Chancellor Charles Reed pulled down $426,444 in total compensation in 2011. And Cal State University East Bay President Mohammed Gayoumi roped in $417,880. President Obama makes only $400,000.

"They have no conscience," Nicholas Bavaro told us of the administrators pulling down the high pay; he's the president of Bavaro Benefit Advisers in Modesto, and he sat on the California Citizens Compensation Commission, which determines the pay and benefits of state legislators and statewide elected officials. "They raise the tuition rates. They cut programs from budgets. It takes longer for kids to graduate now – five years for a four-year degree. Yet the administrators are lining their own pockets." He said compensation should be based on performance. "No public employee ought to be paid that kind of money providing the lousy results of people coming out of our university system." According to the CSU Graduation Initiative website, "As a system, the CSU graduates just over 50 percent of its students in six years."

That's pathetic. The initiative "strives to raise the freshman six-year graduation rate by eight percentage points by 2015, and cut in half the existing gap in degree attainment by CSU's under-represented minority students." Let's hope the initiative succeeds. But why was the rate so low to begin with? We suggested putting university administrative pay under the purview of the Citizen Compensation Commission. "You would need a vote of the people to do it," via an initiative, Mr. Bavaro said. "It would be good."